


To Be Dammed

by RK_Anon (Rochelle_Templer)



Series: Ineffable Husbands Bingo fics [1]
Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst and Feels, Extended Scene, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), M/M, and yes I couldn't resist writing my own spin on the burning bookshop scene, did I mention angst? because yes..., or more like getting more in-depth with a scene, so only mistaken character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-28 07:43:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20060464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rochelle_Templer/pseuds/RK_Anon
Summary: After thousands of years of it, Crowley figured he knew what being dammed meant.The Fall, the grind of carrying out Satan’s agenda for the Earth across millennia, the horrors that he was forced to behold, Crowley had experienced it all of this and had understood it to be the meaning behind damnation.Reality was not so kind.For the Ineffable Husbands Bingo square: Failure to Save.





	To Be Dammed

**Author's Note:**

> This fic takes place during the scene where Crowley finds Aziraphale's bookshop burning in Episode Five. While watching it a second time, a joke from Episode One suddenly took on a slightly sadder meaning to me.
> 
> This is the first of a series of fics that is part of the Ineffable Husbands Bingo challenge.

_‘I should have known. Why didn’t I think of it before now?’_

_‘Stupid, stupid, stupid….’_

Crowley’s foot pressed down onto the accelerator a bit more, a reflex response to the tightening of his jaw. He would have liked to go even faster, but he knew that he was already at risk of drawing attention to himself by miracling away all obstacles on the road. Normally, he wasn’t worried about catching the eyes of humans and only mildly concerned about demons who could be watching.

But this time it could mean alerting the rest of Hell to Hastur and Liger’s failures. Discovery was inevitable, but there was no need to hurry it along. 

Crowley’s eyes narrowed. The streets were becoming a smear on his windows. It had become so blurry; he just barely dodged that woman who was yanking a boy in a green t-shirt behind her at the crosswalk. After zigzagging past her, Crowley got an afterimage of that woman collapsed onto the sidewalk on the other side of the street. The boy was standing next to her, bemused, while she shouted obscenities at the zooming Bentley.

_‘Good. Maybe now you’ll think twice about dragging your kid along the next time you want to do something idiotic enough to get you killed.’_

Crowley actually managed a hint of a grim smile. No, idiots never learn. Hastur and Liger sure didn’t. That’s why Liger was currently a puddle of demon goo and Hastur was stuck in answering machine hell. Once again, he wished that he had destroyed that answering machine tape by dumping it into what was left of the holy water. Then again, there was no guarantee that that would have worked. The holy water was polluted by demon sludge and might not have the same effect on the tape.

If Crowley was going to risk coming so close to something as dangerous as holy water, he wanted more than a notion that it might work. Aziraphale would never forgive him otherwise.

_‘Aziraphale….’ _

A twinge of something sharp and cold shot up his spine. It was while he was cackling over his triumph against the forces of Evil and Idiocy that Hastur’s shrieking stirred up a disturbing thought into his brain.

_"You and your best friend, Aziraphale, you’re both dead meat!”_

Crowley’s knuckles turned white, joints straining against skin. Beelzebub and their minions might see Aziraphale as an accomplice. Or as a stumbling block. Either one was something that Hell would never tolerate.

Also, if they had figured out Down There about his plans to thwart Armageddon, there was also a chance that the corresponding idiots Upstairs had become aware that one of their own was not stepping in line with the Great and Ineffable Plan. Whatever the Heaven that was.

Either way, Aziraphale would likely be getting visitors of his own before long. And not the usual pesky ones who mistakenly thought that the books in the bookshop were for sale.

In fact, they could be there right now.

_“Listen, I know where the Antichrist is….”_

Crowley ground his jaw, just barely aware enough to stop himself from cracking a tooth. This was all a classic battle tactic, wasn’t it? Divide and conquer. But this time, the two of them had been stupid enough to let themselves be divided at a time when unity was one of their few defenses. Apart, their adversaries would find it much easier to strike.

Granted, Aziraphale was a Principality as well as wonderfully clever and determined, so not the easiest of angels to defeat in a straightforward confrontation. But he was alone, and most likely unprepared.

_“I forgive you.”_

Crowley tried to swallow, but his throat was too rigid to do much more than wheeze. Aziraphale must have forgiven him, he must have. A demon, one of the Fallen and Unredeemable had just been forgiven by an angel. And not the sort of forgiveness people handed out as a flimsy social grace either. This wasn’t someone excusing you for stepping on their foot or spilling a cup of tea onto their lap.

This had been real. Aziraphale had gone beyond tolerating Crowley’s backhanded comment on the angel’s intelligence and had released him from the burden of his mistake. No, it wasn’t just that. Aziraphale was forgiving him for all of it: the Fall, the temptation in the Garden, and a thousand little sins such as bringing mood rings and chain letters into the world.

That was why Aziraphale was finally willing to share what he knew about the Antichrist, despite saying that he never would. How else could he take his most deliberate step away from Heaven yet?

And Crowley…he hadn’t see any of it. Not until just now. Before, he’d been too angry, too frustrated, too scared… too hurt… to understand the gift Aziraphale had given him.

Crowley thrust his hand into his pocket and got out his phone, tapping at the screen while maintaining a cursory interest in the road. He had already tried Aziraphale’s number once as he was dashing out of his flat. Crowley hadn’t gotten an answer then, but had done his best to not panic over it. Maybe a customer had come into the shop. Or maybe Aziraphale was double-checking and then triple-checking the information he had gotten on the Antichrist. The angel was meticulous. Annoyingly so.

Or maybe the phone line was simply acting up again. Cell phone service in London could be so easily disrupted, as Crowley well knew by now. Plus, Aziraphale continued to cling to that dinosaur of a phone rather than update to something from the 21st century, so it was entirely possible that the antique finally gave out.

No answer again. No, not quite. More like something was interfering with the call. Like a phone idling off its cradle.

Crowley pushed his foot down again. To Heaven with being inconspicuous. Heaven or Hell was sure to catch up to him eventually anyway.

* * *

The first thing Crowley thought upon seeing flames bursting out of the windows of the bookshop was how Aziraphale was sure to be heartbroken.

Despite the efforts of the fire fighters surrounding the place, it was clearly a loss. Windows were shattered, walls scorched and beginning to flake with ash, smoke billowing out and blanketing every surface.

The books were burning. Aziraphale’s books. The angel’s most valuable, most beloved possessions were disintegrating within the flames.

Burning. Everything. All of it burning. All….

_‘Aziraphale…!”_

Crowley slammed on his brakes and leapt out toward the entrance. He’d only heard the firefighter asking if his was his bookshop on the edge of his conscious thought. The scathing reply had been more about demonic instinct than deliberate snark.

It was right after he snapped the doors shut behind him that Crowley finally realized what had made him so agitated all the way over here. It wasn’t nerves over more agents of Hell tracking him or Aziraphale down. Nor was it unfocused anger and fear over how things had spiraled so far out of control.

It was about what he was _not_ feeling. And that was any trace of Aziraphale’s presence.

Agitation immediately switched to blind panic.

“Aziraphale?! Aziraphale, where the Heaven are you, you idiot?”

“I can’t find you!”

Crowley spun around, trying to ignore the fact that the couch where he had spent countless evenings getting drunk and watching the angel laugh and smile was being consumed by the fire. Right now, he was too focused on finding any trace of Aziraphale.

Normally, Crowley simply knew when Aziraphale was nearby. It wasn’t something he could actually define and articulate. It was just…an awareness. Like the way a person is aware of the air around him, even if they weren’t consciously thinking about it. And just like air, once it was gone, all that was left was suffocating terror.

Flames licked the floor at Crowley’s feet, but did not dare touch him. Charred pages of books fluttered down with fiery wings. The burning was intensifying, fueled by a force that did not seem entirely organic to Earth. There was an after-aura, but Crowley couldn’t be sure if it was ethereal or demonic in nature. It had degraded too much to be sure.

“Aziraphale, for God…for Satan… aahh for somebody’s sake where are you?!”

Pushing down his fear as best he could, Crowley closed his eyes and concentrated, stretching his mind outward on a desperate search for the angel. It wove through London…England…Europe…Earth…. His brain searched every corner of the planet he could think of. Still nothing. None of that familiar, comforting feeling of the quiet rustle of pages turning in an old book, of a ray of sunshine caressing your face through a window, of the scent of warm vanilla.

Nothing. There was nothing of what he felt when Aziraphale was on Earth.

Crowley was so wrapped up in stretching his mind as far as it could go, he couldn’t anticipate the blast of water coming in through the broken window in time to dodge it. The force of it was centered in his chest, knocking him off his feet onto a floor covered in wet ash.

The demon didn’t mind. The fire needed to be stopped before it burned through other things: people, other buildings, cars. Before it turned everything black and brittle. Before it destroyed everything.

Everything…

_‘Aziraphale….’_

The connection made Crowley bolt back up into a sitting position. Aziraphale was gone. Burned away from his body on Earth. Probably burned out of existence.

Crowley’s throat constricted again, his breaths hitching.

“You’ve gone. Somebody killed my best friend!”

Rage flooded his body, searing every nerve. If he could set fire to everything that ever was or ever could be, Crowley was certain that he would.

“Bastards! All of you!”

Crowley took a shuddering breath. Just as quickly as it had been ignited, most of the anger bled away, like water receding from a shore. That fury had simply been too intense to maintain. What was left was a confused, pleading anger that asked why Aziraphale had to be taken.

And why no one had been merciful enough to allow him to follow the angel.

Another crackle of blackened paper drifting in front of the demon’s eyes made him bend his head downward. It was then that he spotted a book beside him. It was a bit charred on the cover, but otherwise intact. A miracle Aziraphale would have whole-heartedly approved of.

_‘Aziraphale….’_

Crowley grabbed the book, sitting it on his lap and squinting at the title. _The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter_. Why did that sound so familiar?

Of course, it wasn’t unusual at all to find a book of prophecy here. They were Aziraphale’s favorite hobby, to find every last….

_‘Yes! That was it! Agnes Nutter! That’s why it sounded so familiar.’_

Crowley tightened his hold on the book. This was something Aziraphale had babbled about for the last couple of centuries. The Holy Grail of Prophecy Books, he had called it. Aziraphale had actually dedicated years to the single-minded quest to find this book, a book which was thought to have no remaining copies in existence.

And here it was. The angel had finally done it. Of course he had. Aziraphale was so clever, if anyone could find it, he would.

Crowley slowly got to his feet, the book clutched against his chest. He might not be able to save any more of Aziraphale’s treasures, but he would save this. Granted, it might only last a few hours longer than the rest of them what with the world ending and all. But Crowley would be dammed…well, dammed again…if he was going to allow whoever killed Aziraphale to have the satisfaction of obliterating every last thing that was precious to the angel.

He had almost made it to the door before he realized that something…something else…was missing. His brow furrowed which turned out to be enough to remind him of what it was.

_‘Sunglasses. Yes, they must have come off when that blasted water hit me. Stupid. Those humans should have tried something a little more productive…like actually aiming for the fire. Now, where did they…?’_

It only took a few seconds of scanning the debris at his feet before Crowley found them. Or what was left of them. The frames were warped, the lenses cracked. Crowley knew that he could still wear them, but it would look like someone smashed him in the face with a cricket bat.

He put them on anyway. He didn’t care. Right now, the only thing that was important was that no one could see his eyes, and not because how humans might react to them.

Once he was outside though, he could see the absurdity of wearing these busted shades when he had plenty of spare pairs in the Bentley. Why not just toss these away? Even though there also wasn’t any point to littering for its own sake anymore.

Decision made, he flung the glasses away and sauntered through the rain to his car. Once he was inside, Crowley sped off as fast as he could, desperate to get away from the sight of the burning bookshop. He heard the sound of an explosion, but made a point of not thinking any more about it.

Crowley stared at the road, his mind going blank, overwhelmed by the grey mass of emotions building inside. He still had enough presence of mind to remember to fetch another pair of sunglasses from his glove compartment. Once this barrier to the world was firmly back in place, he could go back to concentrating on nothing.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t successful. Instead of nothing he got dozens, hundreds of stray fragments of memories seeping into his brain. Memories of evenings spent with Aziraphale, drinking, laughing and listening to the angel read Milton and Oscar Wilde to him.

_“Godfathers. Well, I’ll be dammed.”_

_“It’s not that bad when you get used to it.”_

Crowley blinked. Had he really said that to Aziraphale? He must have. But when was that?

The answer came to him in less than a second. Yes, it was back when they came up with the harebrained plan to thwart the Apocalypse by raising Warlock to be as neutral as possible. If any of their other plans had been a bigger dud than that one, Crowley was hard pressed to think of it at the moment.

_“It’s not that bad when you get used to it.”_

It was just a joke, but, of course, Aziraphale hadn’t seen the humor in it. And right now, Crowley couldn’t see it either.

To be dammed. After thousands of years of it, Crowley figured he knew what being dammed meant.

He could still remember the moment of his Fall: the sickening rush as he plummeted from Heaven, the horror of finally hitting bottom and being submerged into Brimstone, the way the fire burned everything from within and without. Crowley could still feel the aftereffects from his immersion into Hellfire once in a while: a creeping heat that felt like dread.

He also was thoroughly familiar with the workings of Hell: its convoluted power structure, the twisted bodies and minds that lurked there, and the evil work he was expected to do. Crowley preferred to go with the small, vague sorts of evil that humans always had the choice to opt out of. But even at that small scale, his possession by Hell meant that he had to witness some of the most depraved, malicious activities which were conceived by demons _and_ humans in equal measure. And Crowley figured the humans would outstrip them on a creative front eventually.

The Fall, the grind of carrying out Satan’s agenda for the Earth across millennia, the horrors that he was forced to behold, Crowley had experienced it all of this and had understood it to be the meaning behind damnation.

Reality was not so kind.

Damnation was not the Fall, the Fire, or the Destruction of body, mind and soul. It was the afterward, what was left behind. It was what continued to exist even though it had no right to.

There was another boom of thunder, but Crowley didn’t hear it. Armageddon was coming, but he had already lost what mattered most to him. Aziraphale isn’t…wasn’t…just his best friend and the one closest to his heart. The angel had been hope. Hope that his soul would recover from its descent into Hell. Hope that he had earned at least a small measure of forgiveness for what he had done. Forgiveness in the form of someone who he could feel for, care for and who cared about him.

But now, the angel…his angel…was gone. All because Aziraphale had given in to the temptation of listening to him.

Crowley shook as he clung to the steering wheel, willing himself to try to race away from the grief that he knew would overtake him.

Dammed. That is what he was. And that is what he would always be.

**Author's Note:**

> I also have a sideblog dedicated to Good Omens and my fannish ramblings on Tumblr: codicesandflora.tumblr.com


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